Why media companies now insist they are media companies, and why that matters

Debates over whether and how to regulate social media platforms have often hinged on whether these companies should be understood primarily as technology firms or as media entities (Napoli & Caplan, 2017). Initially, platforms insisted they were merely technology companies. More recently, however, they have come to embrace the identity of media companies—asserting significant editorial discretion in how they present and curate content.

This presentation revisits the arguments made in the authors’ 2018 paper, “When Media Companies Insist They’re Not Media Companies: Why They’re Wrong, and Why That Matters,” and traces the rhetorical evolution of platforms through the legal arguments and judicial reasoning in NetChoice LLC v. Moody and NetChoice LLC v. Paxton. It explores why platforms have adopted this new framing, and what implications it holds in the current U.S. political climate and in the broader global regulatory landscape.

About Robyn Caplan

Robyn Caplan is an Assistant Professor at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy, and a Senior Lecturing Fellow in the Center for Science & Society at Duke University. Her research examines the impact of inter-and-intraorganizational behavior on platform governance and content moderation. Her most recent work examines the history of the verified badge (the blue checkmark) at platforms.